Breaking News: The US Supreme Court Redefines 'Murder'

In a breathtaking decision, the US Supreme court today has decided that the definition of 'murder' is too broad. It has helped 'tighten' the legal definition. No longer will the use of just 'any' weapon to take a life be considered murder. The justices have decided that only a killing with a 45 calibre weapon, or larger, is required to meet the tightened definition of murder. In a surprise move, they have ruled that any weapon less than 45 calibre isn't a 'serious gun' and therefore there could be 'no intent or expectation of murder'. At best, a person who plugs another with 7 or 8 shots from a 32 calibre gun would only be guilty of 'winging' a person and any any death that ensued would be completely 'unexpected', so the death must necessarily be judged as 'manslaughter' and not murder.

The above is nuts... yes I'm kidding...

But that is an analogy to what the right-wing, crazed US court has decided today with respect to Jeffrey Skilling. From Reuters:

The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday set aside a ruling that upheld the conspiracy conviction of former Enron Corp executive Jeffrey Skilling, and sent the case back for more proceedings.

Skilling is the guy who mocked conventional morality and led Enron into such nefarious schemes as playing 'hide the losses' and created the fantasy game of pick your own profit number since under Skilling, Enron adopted mark to market accounting, in which anticipated future profits from any deal were tabulated as if real today. He's another example of his utter contempt for honesty and the law (from Wikipedia):

Skilling joked about the California energy crisis at one meeting of Enron employees by asking "what is the difference between California and the Titanic? At least when the Titanic went down, the lights were on".

This from a man running a company that squeezed electricity providers to shut down generation stations so that Enron could charge more and profit from extortionary rates in selling power to energy starved California.

Fraud, what fraud? The US Supreme Court has defined fraud to only occur when there is a bribe or a kickback:

Section 1346, which proscribes fraudulent deprivations of “the intangible right of honest services,” is properly confined to cover only bribery and kickback schemes. Because Skilling’s alleged misconduct entailed no bribe or kickback, it does not fall within the Court’s con-finement of §1346’s proscription.

Oh yeah, so the next time a used car salesman tells you that "this baby only has 100 miles on it, it was driven only once a month to and from the store by grandma" when in fact it was used in stock car races and had 300,000 miles on it and been through a dozen major crashes, this isn't fraud!. No siree. The Wikipedia article on fraud which begins:

In the broadest sense, a fraud is an intentional deception made for personal gain or to damage another individual; the related adjective is fraudulent.

is completely misleading. That 'interpretation' is way too broad, says the Supreme Court. Deception isn't enough. Personal gain isn't enough. You only get fraud if there is bribery or a kickback involved.

What will be the next move by the Supreme Court? I'm expecting them to 'tighten up' the definition of bribery. Take note criminals! From now on, when you buy off the police, make sure you aren't just handing them money in a bag to get complicity in some criminal conspiracy. No siree! Make sure they sign a contract. That way, you are 'honestly' making a business deal to acquire their time and effort and no longer sinking to the contemptible crime of 'bribery'.

The US Supreme Court has sunk to a new low. In 2000 they stole an election from Al Gore and gave it to the idiot George Bush which led to a number of disasters for the US. Apparently the ultra-rich and their bought-and-paid-for minions on the US Supreme Court haven't had enough of this kind of ideological idiocy. The Supreme Court has given new impetus to judicial tomfoolery -- also known a strict constructionism -- with this latest 'interpretation' of the law. Sadly, this mucking around with 'legal interpretations' has thoroughly corrupted the US legal system by turning it into a plaything of right wing ideologues.